On Tue, 28 May 2002 08:47:59 -0700, Mary <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

>There has been a huge increase in heart disease. Is this due to:
>
>l. too much sugar in the diet
>2. trans fats (frankenfats)
>3. foreign proteins
>
>I believe it's all of the above, but which is the most significant?

The fallacy in this way of looking at the situation is that you are
starting with assumptions (3 of them).   In order to get to the truth of
something, you have to ideally start with no assumptions at all.

"Sugar" is just a refining of the juice of the sugar cane plant, which
itself, AFAIK, is an entirely paleo food prized by Asian children for
thousands of years.

I would guess that there has not been any great increase in the per
capita consumption of "sugar" during the period where heart disease has
increased.

During that same period, due to agribusiness lobbyists, the government
started its advocacy of the "low fat" diet.   People did not substitute
"sugar" for the fatty foods they used to eat (like meat), instead they
substituted "starches", like bread and potatoes.

Since protein usually is found in combination with fat, the "low fat"
diet simply resulted in a large increase in the consumption of
carbohydrates.

And, in fact, the long-term study of Finnish policemen that was
published in the journal Circulation, showed that the one indicator that
had the greatest correlation with heart disease was excessive insulin
level (which is largely caused by excess carbohydrate consumption).


--
Cheers,

Ken
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